Uncertain Veracity Judgements: Does the Framing of the Question Influence Deception Detection?

In deception research, little consideration is given to how the framing of the question might impact the decision-making process used to reach a veracity judgement. People use terms such as “sure” to describe their uncertainty about an event (i.e., aleatory) and terms such as “chance” to describe their uncertainty about the world (i.e., epistemic). Presently, the effect of such uncertainty framing on veracity judgements was considered. By manipulating the veracity question wording the effect of uncertainty framing on deception detection was measured. The data show no difference in veracity judgements between the two uncertainty framing conditions, suggesting these may operate on a robust and invariant cognitive process.